as of Progress; only a somewhat less degree of them will on the
average suffice for the former purpose than for the latter.

  To pass now from the mental to the outward and objective
requisites of society; it is impossible to point out any contrivance
in politics, or arrangement of social affairs, which conduces to Order
only, or to Progress only; whatever tends to either promotes both.
Take, for instance, the common institution of a police. Order is the
object which seems most immediately interested in the efficiency of
this part of the social organisation. Yet if it is effectual to
promote Order, that is, if it represses crime, and enables every one
to feel his person and property secure, can any state of things be
more conducive to Progress? The greater security of property is one of
the main conditions and causes of greater production, which is
Progress in its most familiar and vulgarest aspect. The better
repression of crime represses the dispositions which tend to crime,
and this is Progress in a somewhat higher sense. The release of the
individual from the cares and anxieties of a state of imperfect
protection, sets his faculties free to be employed in any new effort
for improving his own state and that of others: while the same
cause, by attaching him to social existence, and making him no
longer see present or prospective enemies in his fellow creatures,
fosters all those feelings of kindness and fellowship towards
others, and interest in the general well-being of the community, which
are such important parts of social improvement.

  Take, again, such a familiar case as that of a good system of
taxation and finance. This would generally be classed as belonging
to the province of Order. Yet what can be more conducive to
Progress? A financial system which promotes the one, conduces, by
the very same excellences, to the other. Economy, for example, equally
preserves the existing stock of national wealth, and favours the
creation of more. A just distribution of burthens, by holding up to
every citizen an example of morality and good conscience applied to
difficult adjustments, and an evidence of the value which the
highest authorities attach to them, tends in an eminent degree to
educate the moral sentiments of the community, both in respect of
strength and of discrimination. Such a mode of levying the taxes as
does not impede the industry, or unnecessarily interfere with the
liberty, of the citizen, promotes, not the preservation only, but
the increase of the national wealth, and encourages a more active
use of the individual faculties. And vice versa, all errors in finance
and taxation which obstruct the improvement of the people in wealth
and morals tend also, if of sufficiently serious amount, positively to
impoverish and demoralise them. It holds, in short, universally,
that when Order and Permanence are taken in their widest sense, for
the stability of existing advantages, the requisites of Progress are
but the requisites of Order in a greater degree; those of Permanence
merely those of Progress in a somewhat smaller measure.

  In support of the position that Order is intrinsically different
from Progress, and that preservation of existing and acquisition of
additional good are sufficiently distinct to afford the basis of a
fundamental classification, we shall perhaps be reminded that Progress
may be at the expense of Order; that while we are acquiring, or
striving to acquire, good of one kind, we may be losing ground in
respect to others: thus there may be progress in wealth, while there
is deterioration in virtue. Granting this, what it proves is not
that Progress is generically a different thing from Permanence, but
that wealth is a different thing from virtue. Progress is permanence
and something more; and it is no answer to this to say that Progress
in one thing does not imply Permanence in everything. No more does
Progress in one thing imply Progress in everything. Progress of any
kind includes Permanence in that same kind; whenever Permanence is
sacrificed to some particular kind of Progress, other Progress is
still more sacrificed to it; and if it be not worth the sacrifice, not
the interest of Permanence alone has been disregarded, but the general
interest of Progress has been mistaken.

  If these improperly contrasted ideas are to be used at all in the
attempt to give a first commencement of scientific precision to the
notion of good government, it would be more philosophically correct to
leave out of the definition the word Order, and to say that the best
government is that which is most conducive to Progress. For Progress
includes Order, but Order does not include Progress. Progress is a
greater degree of that of which Order is a less. Order, in any other
sense, stands only for a part of the pre-requisites of good
government, not for its idea and essence. Order would find a more
suitable place among the conditions of Progress; since, if we would
increase our sum of good, nothing is more indispensable than to take
due care of what we already have. If we are endeavouring after more
riches, our very first rule should be not to squander uselessly our
existing means. Order, thus considered, is not an additional end to be
reconciled with Progress, but a part and means of Progress itself.
If a gain in one respect is purchased by a more than equivalent loss
in the same or in any other, there is not Progress. Conduciveness to
Progress, thus understood, includes the whole excellence of a
government.

  But, though metaphysically defensible, this definition of the
criterion of good government is not appropriate, because, though it
contains the whole of the truth, it recalls only a part. What is
suggested by the term Progress is the idea of moving onward, whereas
the meaning of it here is quite as much the prevention of falling
back. The very same social causes- the same beliefs, feelings,
institutions, and practices- are as much required to prevent society
from retrograding, as to produce a further advance. Were there no
improvement to be hoped for, life would not be the less an unceasing
struggle against causes of deterioration; as it even now is. Politics,
as conceived by the ancients, consisted wholly in this. The natural